Yeah, not the Crooked River in Oregon, which I fished a long time ago. I’m talking Crooked Island in the Bahamas. This report is courtesy of Fly Paper, the blog by Scott Heywood.
Damn fine picture.
Archives
10
May 12
Has bonefishing ruined you?
I know Rebecca’s email was partly in good fun, but I got to thinking about what’s happened to my trout fishing since I discovered bonefishing.
I have to say, I do it less now and if I had to choose between walking a stream and wading a flat, I would likely pick the flat 99 times out of 100 times. I guess I need to explain that I LOVE walking my streams. My home waters are dear, dear places to me. Sacred, even. It is an odd thing to acknowledge that they’ve slid down the pecking order and that places like Alaska or Montana are now further down on my desired destinations than Abaco and Andros.
I don’t know how to fit it all in. I want to get on the flats every opportunity I can and yet I know that I really can’t do it that often and that I have many, many more opportunities to fish places like the McCloud, the Metolius or the Madison than I do Belize or Los Roques or Christmas Island.
At the same time I see my trout fishing slump, I know that my bonefishing has probably made me as good an angler as I have ever been. My casting is much, much better. I can understand stalking fish now. I understand gear better and know many more knots.
I am more well rounded, but my days on water are down to the 20’s now. My high was the one season I guided when I was on the water (either fishing or guiding) for a total of about 200 days that year.
This weekend I’ll actually be back up on my home water (with Matt, who I met on the Cuba trip). I’ll be on the McCloud and maybe the Upper Sac or the Pit or Hat Creek. I’ll enjoy it. I’ll love it even. Still… it isn’t the flats.
Have you had this experience with your own fishing? I think I’m probably not alone.
The McCloud... Upstate California.
08
May 12
A complaint letter at Andros South
Rebecca is ruined… ruined for #20 flies and fish that don’t show her her backing.
I understand.
She was driven to write a complaint letter to Andros South (read it there).
It’s been exactly one year since I came home from a week of fly fishing for bonefish at Andros South and I have a couple of bones to pick over the following issues I experienced (suffered) as a direct result of a week at Deneki Fly Fishing paradise.
Rebecca's first bonefish
07
May 12
Cuba, after I left
I had to go home. I didn’t have that much vacation time or idle money and I needed to get back to my girls. However, the trip wasn’t over and the gang that I left added some members and kept going strong.
Luckily, Jim Klug was still there with a camera and he kept on putting it all in pixels (here’s the gallery of that second week).
Here’s one of the folks that joined just as I left. Miles Nolte is a name you might recognize. He’s an author and the new voice of angling at Gray’s Journal.
Nice fish Miles.
I got to talk to Miles a little in the lobby of the hotel before I headed back. He was excited about the week ahead. I can understand why. Wish I had been able to stay and head to the Island of Youth with Avalon, but, life was calling. I feel pretty fortunate to have been there for the week I was. It was a very special trip and one I’ll hold close for a long, long time.
06
May 12
A Boca Paila DIY video
Well… that looks interesting… very interesting indeed.
Some folks probably won’t like me posting that. It’s probably their secret. Luckily, there are enough secrets out there that they can’t possibly all be as secret as you think.
04
May 12
Bonefishing Shirt Week – Simms
Not a bad looking shirt here with the twin bones. I haven’t seen this anywhere, but I like it.
Oh Bones. I could never be mad at you.
You can find this one at the Simms website.
02
May 12
Bonefish Shirt Week – 411#3
Matt over at the blog 411#3 has a series of shirts soon to be available based on his 4 tenants of saltwater fly fishing. These certainly do ring true for me and I’ll be getting one of these in the not too distant future.
Indeed.
30
Apr 12
Bonefish Shirt Week – Deneki’s Bones
I figured I’d devote an entire week to bonefish t-shirts and give a little shout out to the ones I’m loving from around the web.
First… Deneki now has an on-line store. You can get their pretty frigging cool looking bonefish shirt here.
Love it.
29
Apr 12
The Fin – T&C Part II
The Fin recently went to Turks & Caicos for round two of his DIY adventure.
the one hour of fishing you get when the sun is high enough to see fish until the first kid runs through the flat can be awesome.
28
Apr 12
My next fishing trip – my honeymoon
So, for those of you keeping track, this last year has been a crazy one for me. I got back from Andros in April of last year to a critically low Domestic Tranquility Index that kept finding new lows, like, Congress Approval Rating kind of lows. That went on for a while until it was clearly not sustainable anymore.
Attorneys, stipulation orders, custody orders, new digs, new furniture, 50/50 split… ya know… just pure joy.
Now that is mostly all water under the bridge (but not like the tides kind of bridge where it flows one way in the morning and the other in the evening, this is permanent kind of flowing under the bridge). I moved beyond bitter or angry or sad a long time ago and that left me open for something wonderful.
That something wonderful and I are going to get hitched come September.
And… looks like the honeymoon will likely be at El Pescador. Yeah, I like the direction we are headed in already.
It will be good to be back, especially for the reason why.
